[745] in ad-lib
Qualifiers for Advance OPAC (long)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (ninadm@MIT.EDU)
Fri Jun 2 13:00:38 1995
From: ninadm@MIT.EDU
To: psac-lib@MIT.EDU, cmg-lib@MIT.EDU, opac-lib@MIT.EDU
Date: Fri, 02 Jun 1995 13:00:17 EDT
A while ago, I promised you a chance to influence one small corner of
the OPAC: search qualifiers. A long time has gone by since we last
communicated about this, so I'll repeat some of the information from
my earlier message.
THE PROBLEM.
As you all know, in the old Geac system, the location and physical
format of each item in our collections are defined by codes for
location and material type. In Advance, it works somewhat
differently. Each item is assigned a "sublocation" (and these will be
the names of our library units) and a "collection" (these are
locations within each unit). In many cases, items are also assigned
"call number prefixes"; these can be used to define the location more
specifically, or to identify the physical format of the item.
In the Advance OPAC, there is a way to define the parameters of a
search by a "qualifier." Any value which is used as a "sublocation,"
"collection," or "call number prefix" can be defined as a qualifier.
I used to think -- and indeed some of you have heard me say -- that
ANY sublocation, collection, or call # prefix could automatically be
used as a "qualifier" in setting OPAC parameters. It turns out that I
was wrong. We must decide which of these values we want Grant to set
up as qualifiers for OPAC searching. Grant tells me that setting up
qualifiers is considerable work, and that having a huge body of them
may affect the overall performance of the OPAC, so we should be
conservative in selecting them, at the same time making sure that our
needs and the needs of library users will be met.
EXAMPLES.
It's clear to me that the names of all library divisions and branches
must be qualifiers. Everyone will want to qualify searches by the
names of library units!
The Music Library has for years been begging for a way to limit
searches to scores CDs. This will allow us to do this.
MIT theses will have "thesis" as a call number prefix, so this will
help us find them.
On the other hand, I (personally) think we can dispense with the
ability to qualify searches by "precat." Even reference, while it
might come in handy, is something we could probably do without.
In other words, we need to decide which of our
locations/collections/formats will be available for users in
qualifying their OPAC searches.
*******************
New information starts here:
The sublocations are the names of the library units. I assume we all
want to use all of these as qualifiers. Please let me know if this
assumption is false.
The collections are:
AGAKHAN [Rotch]
BASEMNT [Dewey]
CENSUS [Rotch]
CIRCDSK
CONSUMR [Hum]
DETECTV [Hum]
GOVDOCS
HDC
JOURNAL
LGFRMAT [Rotch]
LIMITED [Rotch]
MAPROOM
MCRFORM
MEDIA
PAMPHLT
PRECAT
REF
REFDESK
RESDESK
RESERVE
STACKS
WSRR [Hum]
NOLOAN1 [Archives -- Rare Book Room]
NOLOAN2 [Archives -- RSC]
NOLOAN3 [Archives -- HDC]
Now remember: not all of the above will be meaningful -- or even
decipherable -- to everyone. A lot of these "collection" codes are
unique to a particular library unit. Collections are supposed to
reflect physical areas, more or less.
Here are the call prefixes:
AUDTAPE
ATLAS
BOOKS
CD
CDROM
DSKETTE
FICHE
FILM
FOLIO
INDEX
LIBRTTO
MAP
MFILM
OVRSIZE
PCAT
RECORD
REGULAR
SCORE
SMALL
THESIS
VDISC
VIDEO
The call prefix field is used to define the location more precisely;
to identify a physical format; or in some other way to clarify what or
where an item is. Again, not all of these are relevant or
comprehensible to all units.
OUR TASK
We need to decide which of the above we want to have available as
search qualifiers. Remember, we cannot use ALL of them, so we have to
pick the ones we think will be most useful for users and/or public
service staff.
AN ADDED WRINKLE
And remember, there is the capacity to modify searches by format, as
distinct from qualifying a search by one of the above values. This
option looks at the MARC format used in cataloging the item. Sam Byrd
has offered up very convincing arguments in support of using the
search qualifiers ONLY in cases where very different items are lumped
together in one MARC cataloging format. You can get a feel for this
by logging into the OPAC, running a search, selecting Modify and
Change limits, then moving your highlight bar down to the Format field
and typing ?? .
PARTING SHOT
I'd dearly love to work on this electronically, but if it just gets to
be too, too much, we'll go ahead and set up a meeting. Please send
your comments to opac-lib, cmg-lib, and psac-lib, so we can discuss
the matter.
Nina
